Undying Duty
by Vixen2004
Summary: The tragic tale of Proffesor Gast and Ilfana as their lives form a devastating bond and their pasts intertwine in a frenzy of misunderstandings and lost causes. (Told around the complications of Aeris' stepmother.)


Hey, it's me, once again. No new chapters, but I re-did this one with Ardwynna Morrigu's comments in mind. Just a few minor adjustments, mainly misused verbs and a couple confused nametags, but I'm still tackling the issue of run on sentences (which is rather evident if you read further.) I don't wanna sound choppy but my long winded-ness needs to die eventually. So I'm hoping for a couple more reviews so I can have more input on how to improve my first chapter. The second one should be up shortly.

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The flowers were ugly.  
  
Not just queasy ugly; they were repulsively ugly. The kind of horrid display that make one's stomach turn into a running ball for a hamster. If Elmyra had any food left in her stomach to puke out, she would have involuntarily done so. But since she was lacking the latter, she figured it might be an option to resort to unneeded body organs to supply the substance that would materialize her agonizingly anticipated cud.  
  
But this was ridiculous.  
  
Ilfana would be turning over in her grave if she knew the stepmother of her beloved daughter was about to lose it upon the patch of playful flowers that Aeris had so humbly slaved over for the past six months. In reality, the garden held enough majestic shimmer to radiate the dismal surroundings of Midgar for the next three miles. However, everything loses its luster when your one and only adopted child is off gallivanting with a rag tag bunch of optimistic heroes who would most likely get the innocent Cetra killed before anything else.  
  
Well, maybe the previous adjective of optimistic in relation to the group was too strong of a word. That one blonde looked grumpy enough to have somehow acquired a male version of premature menopause. Regardless of his hormone structure, that was beyond the point.  
  
But damn, he had sexy eyes . . .  
  
Elmyra shook her head violently. He was way too young for her. But not too young for her care-free daughter . . .  
  
But he was ugly; even more so in comparison to the constantly beaming Cetra. So that was the end of that discussion. The permanent snarl that had stapled itself to his physically monotone face put him in the same rank as those painfully revolting plants that were swaying back and forth in the artificial wind. Aeris used to say they were 'dancing' and scamper up over the wooden picket fence to thrust her arms in the air and dance with them. She'd hop from one foot to another, gently whisking back and forth and back and forth until she grew dizzy and toppled to the ground in one gigantic ball of bountiful pink.  
  
The very memory of the spectacle brought tears to Elmyra's eyes.  
  
Flowers were part of her daughter's life. Whether or not her birth mother shared the same infatuation with the plantista kingdom was still—as it always would be—a well-cloaked mystery. She wouldn't be surprised in the least if Ilfana held the same gift of bringing beauty to any God-Forsaken place in the same manner as Aeris had been notorious for.  
  
But without her, everything resumed its normal state of chronic ugliness and even the garden took on the characteristic of being homely.  
  
While Elmyra was preoccupied staring absent mindedly into the glistening waterfall located behind their humble abode, an all too familiar voice called out to her from the second story of her building.  
  
"Miss Elmie, can I come out and play?"  
  
Elmyra snapped her head to attention and put her reminiscing on pause momentarily. She had forgotten she still had to look after someone even though her daughter was gone.  
  
"Why would you want to play out here?" she asked the young one, a little more coldly than she had previously intended.  
  
A brown head cocked to one side, barley grazing the side panel of the wooden window frame.  
  
"Because I'm bored."  
  
"Go color." Elmyra ordered, not wanting to be disturbed.  
  
"I did."  
  
"Go play with your dolls."  
  
"I did."  
  
"Go dress up."  
  
"I did," she replied for the hundredth time, dangling a string of martegra beads from the window for emphasis. In most towns, the sun would be dancing in the reflection of the dramatic necklace but Midgar had no room for the sun's presence. So the beads remained lifeless and dull in the outstretched palm of the little girl's hand.  
  
"You're clothes are ugly. I liked Tifa's clothes much better."  
  
"I wouldn't fit in Tifa's clothes," Elmyra quipped dryly, realizing she was not as well endowed as the aforementioned.  
  
"Tifa's clothes were cool and . . . and . . ." the girl paused, searching for the word that was lost inside her dome shaped head. ". . .trendy."  
  
"Yes, well Tifa worked in a bar. You're lucky she wore any clothes at all."  
  
The four-year-old scratched her head in confusion, she wasn't accustomed to Tifa's name being held in such low regard. Daddy never spoke of her like that. . .  
  
"I think that was mean," the weak voice noted after a moment's worth of pondering. She lowered her hand and left a large tangled clump of hair where her fingers and previously been scratching.  
  
"Yes it was," Elmyra agreed, holding her head high as she tried to stomach the intense bitterness she held for the whole crew that had somehow managed to snatch away her daughter and replace her with this . . . imp.  
  
"Hey!" the replaced Aeris cried in excitement, her honeysuckle eyes lighting up with a bright aura. Her befuddled frown melted into a plastering grin and she leaned over the sill as far as her twig like arms could protrude her. "Can I come and play in the flowers?!"  
  
"No!" Elmyra screamed, her fists clenching in utter defense. A couple strained tears creeped out of her eyes and under her wire framed glasses. Ignoring them she continued to hold an intense stare on the traumatized child as the rascal withered up like a dying plant against the wall. Once the girl was coiled, Elmyra could see foreshadowing signs of the events to come. In a moment, the tiny one had her face streaked in streams of crocodile tears and her innocent lower lip was trembling so much it appeared to be doing a jig. Dropping the martegra beads into the earth bed below, the child whirled around in a flash of girly frills and ran down the hall, her wails of frustration echoing throughout the desolate hallways.  
  
"Marlene, I didn't mean that!" Elmyra called, rubbing her temples fervently. "You know I didn't mean—ohh!" the woman cried in impatience. She could never thank Ilfana enough for taking custody of Aeris when she was still in that dreaded pre school age. Elmyra had received her angel at the tender age of seven so the tantrums and misunderstandings were down to a bare minimum. Marlene, however, was still a demon child in the adoptive parent's eyes, and having her around only caused the mother's anger to fester as she remembered the blissful days of golden silence with her much more mature, older daughter.  
  
With a rash, abrupt about face into the house, Isabel kicked open the worn door and leaned against the weathered frame for support.  
  
Oh how she hated four-year-olds.


End file.
